Mr. Seward’s answer conceding the British demand was very gratifying to Lord Lyons. On December 27 he acknowledged its receipt and said that he would immediately send a copy of this “important communication” to Earl Russell, and that he would at once confer with Mr. Seward concerning the necessary arrangements for the transfer of the “four gentlemen” again into British protection. It thus appears that, without waiting to hear from London, his lordship at once accepted the answer of the Federal government as a final and satisfactory solution of the difficulty. Three days after answering Mr. Seward’s letter, Lord Lyons addressed a note to Commander Hewett, of the English sloop-of-war Rinaldo, directing him to proceed at once with his vessel to Provincetown, a small seaport in Massachusetts, about forty miles from Boston, and receive the released prisoners at that place. His lordship added at the same time: “It is hardly necessary that I should remind you that these gentlemen have no official character. It will be right for you to receive them with all courtesy and respect as gentlemen of distinction, but it would be improper to pay them any of those honors which are paid to official persons.” The transfer was directed to be made “unostentatiously.” Having been conveyed from Fort Warren to Provincetown in the tug-boat Starlight, the prisoners and their luggage were put on board the Rinaldo on the evening of January 1, 1862. Their “only wish,” they said, “was to proceed to Europe.” They were conveyed without delay to the Danish port of St. Thomas, the place to which they were proceeding when taken from the Trent by Captain Wilkes. At St. Thomas they embarked for Europe and reached their respective destinations without further mishap. The capture and removal of the envoys to the United States caused a delay of about seventy days in their journey.

After the surrender had been made and the Confederate emissaries taken away, the prevalent tone throughout the North still upheld the act of Captain Wilkes. Temporary expediency was assigned as the only reason for giving up the men. The validity of the British claim was denied in many public utterances, in most of which care was taken to reserve the right of contesting the matter at a future time when the United States would be better able to do this. The outcome of the whole matter was looked upon by many public men as a national humiliation. In many instances there were expressed feelings of the bitterest indignation toward England and a purpose announced of avenging this insult so wantonly offered the United States in her hour of deepest distress.

On the afternoon of January 7 the speaker of the house of representatives laid before that body copies of the correspondence which had taken place between the secretary of state and the British government relative to the Trent case. An extended debate followed in which there was a free expression of opinion concerning the British demand and the subsequent surrender of the commissioners.

Mr. Vallandigham, of Ohio, thought a mistake had been made in giving up the men. He said that “for the first time has the American eagle been made to cower before the British lion.

“Sir, a venal or fettered and terror-stricken press, or servile and sycophantic politicians in this house, or out of it, may applaud the act; and may fawn and flatter and lick the hand which has smitten down our honor into the dust; but the people, now or hereafter, will demand a terrible reckoning for this most unmanly surrender.”⁠[1]

Mr. Thomas, of Massachusetts, read a carefully prepared speech from manuscript. Some extracts from it are as follows:

“Complaint of the government would be useless if not groundless. It was too much to ask of it to take another war on its hands. Possibly the elaborate and ingenious argument of the secretary might have been spared. The matter was in a nut-shell; the answer in a word. Take them. There are duties lying nearer us. We can wait.

“But we are not called upon, Mr. Speaker, to say that the demand was manly or just. It was unmanly and unjust. It was a demand which, in view of her history, of the rights she had always claimed and used as a belligerent power, of the principles which her greatest of jurists—Lord Stowell—had imbedded in the law of nations, England was fairly estopped to make.”

Continuing his discussion Mr. Thomas said that England had “done to us a great wrong in availing herself of our moment of weakness to make a demand which, accompanied as it was by the pomp and circumstance of war, was insolent in spirit and thoroughly unjust. It was indeed courteous in language, but it was the courtesy of Joab to Amasa as he smote him in the fifth rib: ‘Art thou in health, my brother?’ That message of Lord Russell to Lord Lyons which could cross the Atlantic had not projectile force enough to have passed from Dover to Calais.”

In conclusion he said of the course of England: “But the loss will ultimately be hers. She is treasuring up to herself wrath against the day of wrath. She has excited in the hearts of this people a deep and bitter sense of wrong, of injury inflicted at a moment when we could not respond. It is night with us now, but through the watches of the night, even, we shall be girding ourselves to strike the blow of righteous retribution.”

Mr. Wright, of Pennsylvania, said: “I justify the act as I understand it is justified by the country. Public meetings were everywhere held; Captain Wilkes was everywhere received with acclaim for the act he had done; the secretary of the navy—one of the heads of the departments of this government—approved of that act. I understand the act to have been approved by the whole government. But in the meantime a state of things had arisen making it necessary to resort to expediency in this matter, to save the country from being involved in a war with Europe. In that view, I would rather surrender these rebel refugees a thousand times over than to have them the cause of war. Let England take them; if she has a mind to fete and toast them, let her do it—it is none of our business; if England desires to make lions of Confederate rebels, it is a mere matter of taste. If they have to be surrendered then let them be surrendered under a protest, while we shall remember hereafter that there is a matter to be canceled between the British government and the United States of North America.”

Before the close of the debate Mr. Vallandigham took the floor a second time and stated that under the circumstances he would “prefer a war with England to the humiliation which we have tamely submitted to; and I venture the assertion that such a war would have called into the field five hundred thousand men who are not now there, and never will be without it, and have developed an energy and power in the United States which no country has exhibited in modern times, except France, in her great struggle in 1793.”

A few days after this debate occurred it was proposed in the house to vote $35,000 to pay the expenses of an exhibit of the United States at an international exposition which was soon to be held in London. Mr. Lovejoy, of Illinois, objected to the measure, and said that the United States had “been insulted, dishonored and disgraced by the British nation.” Continuing he said: “That disgrace was all that the nation could bear. We marched up to it ‘sweating great drops of blood.’ We approached it as Christ went up to the cross, saying, ‘if it be possible, let this cup pass from us.’”

Mr. Lovejoy then said that inasmuch as the United States had submitted to be dishonored by Great Britain he thought Americans ought to stay at home until a time should come when they would be able to whip the British nation. Then he would be willing to appear at a world’s exhibition in London. He then likened his own grief to that of the suffering Trojans as related by Æneas to Queen Dido.⁠[2] “Every time this Trent affair comes up,” said he, “every time that an allusion is made to it; every time that I have to think of it, that expression of the tortured and agonized Trojan exile comes to my lips. I am made to renew the horrible grief which I suffered when the news of the surrender of Mason and Slidell came. I acknowledge it, I literally wept tears of vexation. I hate it; and I hate the British government. I have never shared in the traditional hostility of many of my countrymen against England. But I now here publicly avow and record my inextinguishable hatred of that government. I mean to cherish it while I live, and to bequeath it as a legacy to my children when I die. And if I am alive when war with England comes, as sooner or later it must, for we shall never forget this humiliation, and if I can carry a musket in that war I will carry it. I have three sons, and I mean to charge them, and do now publicly and solemnly charge them, that if they shall have at that time reached the years of manhood and strength, they shall enter into that war. I have always doubted the necessity of that surrender. We might have, I think, secured an arbitration at least, and compelled England to have recognized some rule as binding on herself as the law of nations. This we have not secured. If, however, it was a necessity, I could have submitted to it. But I have not reached that exalted sublimation of Christianity which allows me to be insulted and abused and dishonored without feeling some indignation. * * *

“Sir, I trust in God that the time is not far distant when we shall have suppressed this rebellion, and be prepared to avenge and wipe out this insult that we have received. We will then stir up Ireland; we will appeal to the Chartists of England; we will go to the old French habitans of Canada; we will join hands with France and Russia to take away the eastern possessions of that proud empire, and will darken every jewel that glitters in her diadem. Oh! it was so mean and cowardly for a nation saying ‘father’ and ‘mother’ in the same words that we do to come into the house of a brother in the day of his calamity. I can not away with it.”

On January 6 President Lincoln sent to the senate a message transmitting copies of the diplomatic correspondence relative to the Trent case. Three days later the matter was discussed in an extended speech by Mr. Sumner who ably defended the course of the United States government in surrendering the commissioners. He held that the act of Captain Wilkes could be easily vindicated by British precedents, but that it became very questionable when tried by the liberal principles which the United States had always avowed and sought to advance with regard to the sea. He said that the American government, at an early day, had adopted as its policy the principle that only officers or soldiers could be stopped, thus positively excluding the idea of stopping ambassadors or emissaries of any kind while sailing under a neutral flag. In support of this statement Mr. Sumner reviewed American diplomatic history from the beginning so far as it touched upon this question. The doctrine of the United States was fully demonstrated by quotations from the diplomatic dispatches of Monroe and Madison, also by reference to the various treaties of the United States with foreign nations.

“If I am correct in this review,” said Mr. Sumner, “then the conclusion is inevitable. The seizure of the rebel emissaries on board a neutral ship can not be justified according to our best American precedents and practice.

“Mr. President, let the rebels go. Two wicked men, ungrateful to their country, are let loose with the brand of Cain upon their foreheads. Prison doors are opened, but principles are established which will help to free other men, and to open the gates of the sea.”

This speech was timely and effective. It was well received throughout the North. The newspapers commented upon it in the most favorable terms and it doubtless did much to influence public sentiment in support of the surrender.

The news that the British demand had been conceded was a disappointment to the South. “The concession of Mr. Seward was a blow to the hopes of the southern people. The contemplation of the spectacle of their enemy’s humiliation in it was but little compensation for their disappointment of a European complication in the war. Indeed, the conclusion of the Trent affair gave a sharp check to the long cherished imagination of the interference of England in the war, at least to the extent of her disputing the blockade, which had begun to tell on the war-power and general condition of the Confederacy.”⁠[3]

The Richmond Examiner, a representative Confederate newspaper, said: “Never since the humiliation of the Doge and Senate of Genoa before the footstool of Louis XIV has any nation consented to a degradation so deep. If Lincoln and Seward intended to give them up at a menace, why, their people will ask, did they ever capture the ambassadors? Why the exultant hurrah over the event that went up from nineteen million throats? Why the glorification of Wilkes? Why the cowardly insults to two unarmed gentlemen, their close imprisonment, and the bloodthirsty movements of congress in their regard? But, most of all, why did the government of Lincoln indulge a full cabinet with an unanimous resolution that, under no circumstances, should the United States surrender Messrs. Slidell and Mason? Why did they encourage the popular sentiment to a similar position? The United States government and people swore the great oath to stand on the ground they had taken; the American eagle was brought out; he screeched his loudest screech of defiance—then

at the first growl of the lion. This is the attitude of the enemy.”

The Canadian press commented upon the release of Mason and Slidell in the same spirit as did other newspapers that were hostile to the United States. The Toronto Leader was very abusive and declared that the surrender was one of “the greatest collapses since the beginning of time.” The same journal had much to say concerning the “humiliation” of the Federal government. The Montreal Gazette thought the affair was a “bitter, bitter pill for the fire-eaters to cram down their noisy throats.”

In England there was, of course, much rejoicing over the outcome of the matter. The Federal government had been humbled in the eyes of the world and British arrogance had triumphed once more. The English press, including the reviews, generally sustained the course of the government as being necessary and proper. It was said that in America the unbridled passions of democracy controlled, that this force was unyielding and unreasonable, and that a display of military power and a menace of war was necessary to secure just concessions from such a country.

The Quarterly Review discussed this matter as follows: “There ought, then, to have been no difficulty nor demur in disavowing the act of Captain Wilkes, which, we are told, was not authorized by his government and of which he ostentatiously took the whole responsibility upon himself; nor any delay in releasing the prisoners. This is what we should expect from any other European power. But in America the pressure of mob opinion was brought to bear with disastrous weight upon a question the determination of which ought to have been left to the calm and dispassionate judgment of reflecting men, responsible for the character which the United States have to maintain in their relations with foreign powers.”

Continuing his discussion the writer said that the Federal states “are now undeceived as to the real attitude of England. They must see that it is dangerous to try her patience too far. Her forbearance will not be again mistaken for the whispers of fear or attributed to the dictates of self-interest. We have shown that for the sake of restoring to the protection of the British flag four strangers—for whom personally we cared nothing—we were resolved to engage instantly in war.”⁠[4]

It was then said that those who assailed British honor in future would know the consequences in advance. “The lesson has been read; we hope it will be remembered,” continued the writer, “and whatever may now be said of conciliatory letters it must not be forgotten by ourselves that until we had evinced this determination by the dispatch of large and formidable armaments every act of the American government went to show that they fully intended to retain the prisoners.”⁠[5]

Mr. Gladstone, then a member of the English cabinet, in a public speech concerning the matter, tauntingly charged the American people with being unstable and cowardly. He said: “Let us look to the fact that they are of necessity a people subject to quick and violent action of opinion, and liable to great public excitement, intensely agreed upon the subject of the war in which they are engaged, until aroused to a high pitch of expectation by hearing that one of their vessels of war had laid hold on the commissioners of the southern states whom they regarded simply as rebels. Let us look to the fact that in the midst of that exultation, and in a country where the principles of popular government and of democracy are carried to the extreme—that even, however, in this matter of life and death, as they think it to be—that while ebullitions were taking place all over the country, of joy and exultation at capture—that even then this popular and democratic government has, under a demand of a foreign power, written these words, for they are the closing words in the dispatch of Mr. Seward: ‘The four commissioners will be cheerfully liberated.’”⁠[6]

In the exultation over the “victory,” as it was called, less notice was taken of Mason and Slidell personally. Their importance to the British nation diminished after they were surrendered. It was enough to know that, under the menace of a foreign war in addition to the domestic insurrection the United States government had yielded to a peremptory demand to surrender the prisoners, and that they had actually been restored to British protection again. The London Star said: “When Mason and Slidell have been surrendered to us it will surely be time to declare in what capacity we, as a nation, are to receive them—whether as the envoys of Mr. Jefferson Davis or as inoffensive visitors to a country where the rebel slave-owner and fugitive negro are welcome alike to the protection of the law.” The Times said: “We do sincerely hope that our countrymen will not give these fellows anything in the shape of an ovation. The civility that is due to a foe in distress is all that they can claim. We have returned them good for evil, and sooth to say, we should be exceedingly sorry that they should ever be in a situation to choose what return they will make for the good we have now done them. They are here for their own interests, in order, if possible, to drag us into their own quarrel, and, but for the unpleasant contingencies of a prison, rather disappointed, perhaps, that their detention has not provoked a new war. When they stepped on board the Trent they did not trouble themselves with the thought of the mischief they might be doing an unoffending neutral; and if now, by any less perilous device, they could entangle us in the war, no doubt they would be only too happy. We trust there is no chance of their doing this, for, impartial as the British public is in the matter, it certainly has no prejudice in favor of slavery, which, if anything, these gentlemen represent. What they and their secretaries are to do here passes our conjecture. They are personally nothing to us. They must not suppose, because we have gone to the very verge of a great war to rescue them, that therefore they are precious in our eyes. We should have done just as much to rescue two of their own negroes; and had that been the object of the rescue, the swarthy Pompey and Cæsar would have had just the same right to triumphal arches and municipal addresses as Messrs. Mason and Slidell. So, please, British public, let’s have none of these things. Let the commissioners come up quietly to town and have their say with anybody who may have time to listen to them. For our part, we can not see how anything they have to tell can turn the scale of British duty and deliberation. There have been so many cases of peoples and nations establishing an actual independence, and compelling the recognition of the world, that all we have to do is what we have done before, up to the very last year. This is now a simple matter of precedent. Our statesmen and lawyers know quite as much on the subject as Messrs. Mason and Slidell, and are in no need of their information or advice.”⁠[7]

When the commissioners were surrendered, a portion of the British troops dispatched to Canada to menace the United States had not yet arrived. With a stroke of the wit which often characterized his dealing with his opponents, Mr. Seward proceeded to inform the British consul at Portland, Maine, that these troops would be permitted to land at that city and pass freely through the territory of the United States by rail to their destination, thus avoiding the risk and suffering incident to a passage by the Canadian route beset by the snow and ice of an inclement midwinter season.

AUTHORITIES AND REFERENCES.

1. Congressional Globe, 2d Session 37th Congress.

2. London Quarterly Review, No. 221.

3. Lossing, B. J.: The Civil War in America, Vol. II.

4. Magazine of American History, March, 1886.

5. Newspapers, January, 1862, as follows: Richmond Examiner, Toronto Leader, Montreal Gazette, London Star, London Times.

6. Paris, Compte de: History of the Civil War in America.

7. Pollard, E. A.: The Lost Cause.

8. Southern Law Review, Vol. VIII.

9. Sumner, Charles: Speech in the U. S. Senate, January 9, 1862.

10. Sumner, Charles: Works of, Vol. VII.